after another week of work, so it is called anyway, i took a trip by train to the towns of strasbourg and colmar in the alsace region of france. by train, it took about 2 and a half hours or so to get to strasbourg, but it really was an enjoyable train ride there and back, it would be shorter if we had taken the TGV, train a grande vitesse, the very fast train. leaving on saturday morning and coming back in the early evening on monday, it was just beautiful weather, and the only time that it was overcast we were inside.
from the strasbourg train station, which itself was very cool, a giant glass and steel dome that was built to cover the outside of the existing old train station, went and dropped off stuff at the hostel, and went to go wander around the town. basically there is a giant island surrounded by a canal type thing, lots of old buildings, shops, restaurants, cobblestone streets, museums, churches and more all on it. the big notre dame cathedral is the main thing that people go to see i guess, the outside was certainly impressive, the "astronomical" clock inside was neat as well, climbed the stairs to the top, looked around and such. after the cathedral was some french coffee, and stumbled into this super cool store with awesome clothes and stuff, wish i had more money to have had bought some. there's this one cake/bread thing that they have in alsace, it's something like kugelhof, like a big upside down muffin with raisins and almonds and a big hole in it, but it was definitely tasty. it was really fun just wandering the streets and seeing what there is to see. there are canals and bridges all over the place, with lots of flowers everywhere too, it was a pretty town for sure...lots of tourists though, it was nice in the morning and at night when it quieted down some. stumbled upon a fete de jeux, aka game party, a bunch of games set up for kids to play in a courtyard, but definitely just took that over, there were some sweet games, in french of course but here is where the little bit of french language skills came in handy. i'm glad that i learned some french in school, and also that i remember quite a bit of it as well, it's a beautiful language and i'm going to try to learn more while i'm here...it sounds much better than german...
in one of the canals there were these people playing something like a cross between kayaking and water polo, it was cool really, basically water polo with kayaks and nets suspended several meters in the air, pretty ridiculous at first but then i kinda wanted to play. dinner was good, ate at table on the street, like everyone else does, except for nobody eats at 6, it's just way to early to start the night then, it's more like an apertif at 6, dinner at 8 or 9, then stay out all night - such is the life that i'd like to lead. alsace is supposedly known for it's white wine, riesling, pinot gris, some special ones like muscat as well, had some with dinner, it was very good.
the next morning we headed out to the modern art museum in strasbourg, which i was very pleasantly surprised with how it was. there was at first this really creepy "silences" exhibit with basically just really creepy and messed up stuff, but nonetheless interesting. next was this colours exhibit which was nice because it kinda gave a scientific explanation of colours and such, and then went through how they're interpreted and all that sort of thing, very cool actually. the contemporary art part of the museum i thought was great, although clearly i would say that a lot of "contemporary" art is funny because it's just straight up ridiculous, but there definitely is some really neat stuff that people do. the highlight of the museum for me was the statue of "the thinker", basically the really famous statue of the guy with his chin on his hand and sitting down and thinking, it' on the television and in popular culture and all that. also, this one artist gustave dore, who i had not heard about before, had a bunch of his paintings up in an exhibit, there was one that must have been at least 50x50 feet, just incredible how much detail was in it, just incredible. the rest of his paintings were also very nice. besides all of these exhibits, they had their permanent collection, you know, no big deal, just some picasso thrown in here and there. i'm really glad i went to this museum, until now i haven't seen anything like that before, and i'm looking forward to checking out some of the other great art museums in europe.
in the afternoon we took a short train to the town of colmar, about 50 minutes or so away from strasbourg. i really enjoyed this place, it was a sunday so most of the shops were closed but i really liked the small town atmosphere, it was quiet and it was cool to see some french people go about their everyday business. i love the old squares and the fountains and the people riding around on their scooters and motorcycles and bikes. wandered around a bit, found a beautiful rose garden, listened to some jazz on the street, and had supper, a tarte flambee - basically a really thin piece of dough with creme fraiche cheese and bacon on it, and of course the alsace wine again. also, went on the carousel that was there, made me feel like a child again.
train back to strasbourg, had a good sleep, went out in the morning to get some peaches, chocolate croissants, and coffee, one of the best breakfasts i've had in a while, i wish that cafes at home would have take out coffee as good as that. a little ways away from the train station there was the university campus, which itself was a very old and beautiful building, it's hard to believe that anybody actually goes to school there...i would love to do a semester abroad, anywhere besides calgary now, i think it'd be an amazing experience, it's definitely something i'll think about when i get back. behind some of the university buildings there was this big botanical garden, with just a ton of awesome stuff. a pond with lily pads and flowers, frogs, turtles, baby birds, olive trees, grapevines, bamboo, and definitely some canadian content with douglas firs and trees like that.
after a lot of walking the past few days, we just took the train back to basel, decided to walk around for a bit, went down to the rhine, a pretty big river in europe i guess, but after that i was pretty much done with walking and went home.
in other news, work and everyday life is good, i don't do too much at work, a lot of reading the globe and mail online, drink some terrible coffee from the machine, play with some excel worksheets once in awhile, go on wikipedia, it's all good stuff. but my boss is really cool, and such a good guy, i'm pretty happy with the whole situation really.
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